Alpha
by agentTR
Summary: Pairing : Donald Pierce x invented character Donald Pierce and the big bad wolf, or is it one and only person?
1. Chapter 1

A rustle. The sound of foliage wriggling in the wind that crosses it. Then nothing; no chirping of birds, no cries of animals. 

Her world is absent from human voices but not from noises. She knows that silence is often synonymous with death in nature and the smell, brought again by the wind, confirms the bad news: she is no longer alone in her woods. 

She can smell sweat and powder. In silence she follows the track, her bare feet scarcely touching the vegetal carpet in her course, under cover of the shadows that the trees provide. Twilight is an unfortunate choice of moment to penetrate her territory. 

A few meters away, two men in military trusses slowly advance towards her position, their weapons stuck against their torsos, held by metal hands. They are tall and sluggish and therefore slow. In this half-light, the distance between them is just sufficient for the beast to have the advantage. As one of them goes beyond the tree that hides it, she throws her hand, claws out, against his throat, cutting off his breath. Before the expected groan escapes, she closes it, joining her finger behind his trachea, and pulls, tearing it out in a spongy sound.

When the second man understands that the inert body of his colleague has just collapsed on the ground, the beast is already on him. He falls to his knees, hiccupping, with eyes stunned, trying to hold back with his hands the blood that flows from his gaping neck. 

A sizzle and then a voice emanates from the man:  
"Team three, report"

A few seconds then he starts again, a hint of impatience in the voice:  
"Team three ..." 

Suddenly the leaves crack under the heavy boots of the assailants running behind her. They are still at least four and find both bodies lifeless. Without a word, they disperse, their weapons raised at the level of their faces, and inspect the surroundings, ready to shoot at any threat. But it is her territory and the insistence of these intruders to impose themselves enrages her.

One of the men approaches a tangle of branches and leaves, intrigued by a furtive golden gleam, before perceiving a slight rumbling. The noise soon became guttural and he recoils precipitately.

The shadow that gushes in front of him, growling, makes him stumble and fall heavily on the ground, arms in front of his face, just in time to hold the jaw that is planted in his forearm. The shadow clasps his neck but he has already shouted, and the others re-echo, unleashing a multitude of flashes and detonations as they shoot the silhouette that winds between the trees.

They pursue it but hardly discern it among the dense vegetation and the luminosity almost totally extinct. She can see torches light up and shake at the end of their guns as they accelerate behind her. 

The fugitive prepares to fork when a gun butt hits her forehead, throwing her violently on the ground. Shaking her head to silence the pulse she feels beating inside her temples, she does not have time to stand up as metal fingers grab her neck and hold her to the ground. By reflex she tries to relax the grip by grasping the arm of her assailant with both hands but is slowed down by the playful voice of the man, the same as in the radio:

"Gently baby," he said, pointing the barrel of his pistol on her face.

She distinguishes an authoritarian blue gaze and an insolent smile decorated with a golden tooth. But she also feels that the grip is relaxed slightly. She throws her legs into the air and ties them around the arm that holds her, making a key firm enough to unbalance it and thus deviate the weapon that held her at gunpoint. The assailant tries to remove his arm but she clings tightly to it and he lifts her from the ground instead. She wraps with her arms the bionic hand which still holds her by the neck and manages to let go of a circular movement of her hands, twisting the metal of the wrist and the wires inside of it.

The man releases her, screaming with rage, not with pain. She looks for a way out, she backs off a tree, but it's too late, they're all around her, pointing their weapons and the blinding lights of their torches on her face that she tries to protect from her arms. 

They pant loudly. The man who was holding her stands up and looks at his deformed metal wrist with a disgruntled air. He sighs; he struggles to master his anger, biting his lower lip, his dark eye beneath his frowning brows. Then he clears the blond locks fallen on his forehead and raises a finger of flesh in front of him, whistling breaths cease around him.

"So ... What have we here?" he says, punctuating every word. 

As he advances, the lights that blind the beast subside. The man then sees in front of him a feminine silhouette dressed in dark trousers and a simple tee-shirt of the same color, surmounted by short black and messy hair. She watches him through her clawed fingers, covered with blood and pieces of flesh, which still mask her face. 

It is he who commands. Even she can feel the authority that emanates from him, which from a single raised finger can stop your breath.

She lets her hands fall gently down her face. The man suddenly takes one more step faster than the previous ones and catches her again by the neck, pinning her against the tree behind her. The grip is less powerful than with his artificial hand, but it is sufficient to keep her in respect.

"It looks like we found ourselves a stray cat" he grumbles in her face.

"Fuck you", she spits.

"Oh ... and it talks!" he said cheerfully. "Since you're in the mood honey, you're gonna tell me if you're the only pretty thing that can be found here."

" F ..."

The hand tightens on her neck. He smiles, but his gaze does not express benevolence. "Oh no ... Do not say that again or I'll let my guys have a little fun with you, huh ... So?"

The captive glares at him, but cannot breathe with the hand that crushes her trachea.

"I am alone," she admitted painfully.

The man releases a little pressure and displays a victorious smile.

"That's a good girl!"

This is the moment she would choose to prove him wrong, if a little voice in her head did not dissuade her, saying that this man was somewhat special.

He nodded to one of his men who came forward and pulled out a pair of handcuffs from behind his back.

"You're in for a treat, baby," he adds, while the other is hindering her hands.

Upon contact on her arms, her lips, stained with fresh blood, turn into a fierce grimace, revealing two pairs of canines abnormally long and sharp for a human being.

"What's with the smile, baby?" The man comes closer and closes his grip on her neck.

Her face is only a few centimeters away and she can feel his breath on her cheek, close to her mouth. His scent fills her nose, loaded with pheromones. Her pulse accelerates and her jaw tightens, this proximity disturbs her and causes a shiver that runs through her spine.

"If you ever feel like biting someone again, I'll personally make you swallow your fucking teeth." His voice is nothing but a whisper and his words do not sound as threatening as they should.

He is still close to her, sliding his fingers on her throat until he grabs her chin. She can almost touch his lips, parted in a semblance of smile from which he seems never to depart. For seconds that lengthen, he scrutinizes her face and sees the fury give way to perplexity and doubt in her singularly yellow eyes.

She wanted to react, to repel him, to tear his clear eyes that pierced her. But her body no longer obeys her; her limbs are as numb and left to the goodwill of this man.

Her mind is clear and lucid though. She does not realize it yet, nor does she understand all that this entails, but she knows what this man is. She knows that it is him, the Alpha male.


	2. Chapter 2

She no longer feels the wind on her face, nor, on her skin, the soft warmth of the sun that pierces the treetops. She only feels a hard floor under her body and the cold moisture that envelops her.

The metallic clicking of a door that is opened brings her mind a little more towards the surface.

"Fuck ..." plagues a familiar voice.

Feet rub on the floor and hands raise her a little from the ground by the armpits, and drag her out of whatever the place she's at. She painfully opens one eye and does not immediately understand that the fuzzy stroke that she hardly distinguishes is the trickle of blood that flows from her mouth.

Her consciousness does not yet realize the pain that is about to burst in all her body, the aching and hematoma above her broken ribs. Only her ears perceive a distant sound, the shrill one produced by the rubbing of her legs against the waxed vinyl of the floor, and sometimes the whistle that escapes from her lungs when she inhales.

In the mist of her thoughts, a clear question manages to formulate itself: "Where am I?" Images and scraps of confused memories twist and then settle in order in her head.

Memories where she sees herself, feet and fists tied, thrown into a cage inside a van. There she sees this man, the man who has held her for so long that she does not remember when he stopped doing it. Crouching, inserting his human fingers in the mesh of the fence, he stares at her with curiosity.

"How do you call yourself, mutie? " he questions.

She walks up and faces him, hooking her claws in the fence, just above his own hand.  
She does not intend to reply, to tell him that the parents who were supposed to give her a name had never bothered to do so, as far as she could remember, nor that the children at school called her the beast or still dirty dog, when she showed her teeth, out of patience. She could tell him that for a long time, in the woods where she has lived since she fled from the orphanage, she does not need a name, for no one needs to call her. But she won't, she just wants to observe and understand why this man disturbs her so much.

Despite her silence, he still smiles and does not leave the fence that separates their faces.

"Never mind," he resumed, with a detached look, "we've found your dog's house in the woods, with all your little things..."

He scrutinizes the slightest reaction but the face of the beast is impassive, her gaze fixes a point that seems to be beyond the eyes of her jailer.

"... and then we'll study you, we'll eventually find where you come from ..."

She hears him but does not really listen to him. Absorbed by the emotions that this man causes in her, she focuses on his voice, as if it were the only sound that exists. It sounds deep, posed and reassuring. His slow flow soothes her as a cottony sensation hatches in her chest and then spreads to her neck. She sniffs the fingers that he leaves within reach; the smell of his flesh fills her nostrils with a whiff of comforting warmth. Attracted like a magnet, she rubs her face against the hand of the man, taken by an irrepressible need to curl up against him. 

As her attention focuses on the rough texture of his skin and the warmth that emanates from it, the sudden silence of the man takes her out of her trance. As she crouches down at the bottom of the cage with eagerness, wondering what the fuck she was doing, he lets out a brief mocking chuckle along with a smile that remains suspended on his face for a few moments, before fading away, leaving only perplexity in his eyes.

The surface on which she's lying is more flexible than the ground, almost soft. The dried blood in her nostrils scrambles a little the olfactory information that reaches her brain, but she distinguishes ethereal effluvia. The air is dry and motionless. Her eyes refuse to open, her swollen face is numb. Or is it the substance being injected into her arm that diminishes her senses and her will.

Her erratic thoughts jump from memory to memory without any coherence or connection between them. Some images seem almost unreal, to the point of making her doubt the truth of all the others. Yet, in the midst of this chaos, it is the face of this man who arises, looking at her, speaking to her and touching her. She is certain, it is very real.

"Standing, kitten!"

The man's cheerful voice and the blows he takes against the fence pull her out of her sleep as the doors of the van open.

He takes her through a parking lot, almost empty, then a corridor, then another to an elevator, without a word. He sometimes seizes her by the arm to direct her but remains behind. The beast can feel his gaze on her neck, and, through his silence, a certain confusion emanating from him.  
While the metallic doors close on them and the machine begins its descent, he regains the use of words.

"Why did you let yourself be captured? "

With a raised eyebrow she looks at him over her shoulder, surprised and embarrassed by his perspicacity, and, for any answer, returns the same smile to him that he seems to love.

"Not talking will make your stay much more painful, honey. Others will be less patient than I am ..."

She shrugs and stares at the door in front of her, far from her the idea of admitting any kind of surrender. The man then passes an arm over her shoulder and folds it, striking her throat with his artificial wrist, forcing her to back away against him.

"It could be a hell, baby, but it could be a lot more bearable in here. All you have to do is answer my questions ... " he whispers with an ounce of irritation in his voice, sticking his face against her hair.

He holds her so strongly against him that she can feel his heart beating against her back and the movements of his rib cage when he breathes. He is dangerously close again and the same feeling of helplessness that when he caught her invades her.

"Couldn't help it" she grumbles. 

A tinkle rings and the doors of the elevator open. He holds her back a few moments, trying to understand the meaning of her words and then releases her without a word.

Stifled voices are heard:  
"Mr. Pierce, what the hell happened? Have you seen in what state she is? "  
" It's gonna be fine, she's just a little rattled ..."  
"Are you kidding me ? Did you do that to her? "  
"Why would I? "  
"Your hand for example ..."  
"Listen Doctor Rice, I'll fix this, okay? She just picked up the bad guy and my men are a little tense ..."

The voices moved away. This Pierce, it was him, the troubling man. And the bad guy he talks about, it kind of rings a bell inside her head.

She recalls how her clothes were cut off from her body and her hands tied behind her back to prevent her from hurting the nurses. There she stands, freshly washed, free of blood and dirt, dressed in a simple white cotton blouse that contrasts with the color of her matte skin. It is he who retrieves her at the door of a bathroom, the bad guy. She remembers his eyes bewildered with fear and his cry as she threw herself on him in the woods. The arm of the guard is now covered with a thick bandage, and in his eyes she no longer sees fear but a sort of sadistic disdain when he examines her from top to bottom.

He pushes her in front of him. The chains at her ankles tinkle against the cold ground to the rhythm of the small steps that she is forced to make to advance in the corridors. They cross several of them, a succession of turns, white rooms and gray doors.

It is in front of one of these gray doors that he stops, opens it and then pushes her inside. It is only a box, cold and gray too, whose only light source is a bulb on the ceiling and the only comfort a mattress bare on the floor at the bottom of the room. He follows her and closes behind them.

"On your knees," he ordered.

She glares at him over her shoulder.

"On your knees, bitch! " he yells this time, giving her a blow behind the knee.

By falling to her knees, she calculates the probability of chances she has of getting out of it not too much poked. But he is armed and she is hindered. The chances are slim.

As he goes around her, she hears the characteristic sound of a zip that goes down.

"Finally, it's worse than expected," she thinks, being beaten up does not sound so bad suddenly. Reflecting quickly, she raises her gaze towards the guard's face and ostensibly slams her jaw, showing off her panoply of fangs in a radiant smile. Faced with the vision of his sex cut, the guard interrupts his gesture and an expression of terror distorts his features. 

She might bet he would never dare put a piece of himself in her mouth now, however the relief is short lived, soon fear turns into rage on his face.

"You fucking bitch! " he yells, raising his fist.

She closes her eyes at the same time as the fist crushes on her jaw, throwing reddish saliva foam on the floor. She remembers congratulating herself for having left alive the only prey that had no robotic hands, before other insults and other blows fell on her, until her brain extinguished the light and muted the sound. It is therefore the taste of her own blood that she now feels in her mouth.

She opens her eyes without difficulty, and does not remember the last time she opened them. There is an eternity, maybe, or five minutes ago. First, she wonders if it was only a dream, a rotten thing that she would have eaten by mistake, only the light is strange in this place, artificially clear, it does not resemble her home. Then, when she wants to wave her arms, she feels the thick leather straps that hold her to the bed, too clean to be her own.

"Look at you ! Dr. Rice really does miracles with your species."

The voice and the smell cut her in her reflection. He sits close by; she just has to lean her head to the side to lay eyes on him. The smile on his face and the delighted and considerate look he carries on would almost make her forget that she is being held against her will.

"He gave you one of his famous cocktails, you took back human form in no time," he continues, encouraged by the questioning eyes of the captive. "He has a crush on you, especially since I told him your weird way of reacting with me ..."

She nervously turns away, hoping he will shut up, but Pierce gets up and leans on the bed, clasping his hands under his chin.

" ... Most likely abandoned by parents frightened by your appearance, mistreated by others, you ran away ... Rice is fascinated, really! A mutant returned to the wild! Well, savage ... but that can be tamed it would seem." he finishes in an ironic tone.

"I'm not a fucking dog" she spits furiously, glaring at him.

Pierce straights up gently with a cynical smile.

"I know, you're more like a wolf. Your animal instinct has taken over so much that, like them, you need a pack. And a dominant male, a ... how he said already? An Alpha male?"

A wave of cold sweat suddenly runs through her body. This concept he's talking about, she does not know exactly what it is, nor what it means. She only knows that Pierce causes in her emotions that she has never felt before, needs that her own body has never expressed, such as the intense desire to be protected by someone.

"Apparently, it's me ... your dominant male ..." he says, jubilantly leaning over her face.

"It proves you're just an animal, like me," she precipitately retorts, trying to turn the conversation away.

" Oh no ! Not like you darling! I'm not a fucking mutant. According to Rice, you know I'm stronger than you, that's why you can't hurt me."

" Really ?" she cuts him down, lowering her eyes on Pierce's metal hand, now intact.

He raises his hand and waves his metal fingers in front of his face:

"Oh that ! I do not blame you, you didn't know yet who you were dealing with ... Now you know, and I know : you want me."

He had formulated his last words slowly and taken the most sulphurous tone she had ever heard. His smile is wide enough to reveal his golden tooth while he gives her a charming look.

She suddenly feels her heart pulsate in her temples and her stomach revolt. Overwhelmed by feelings she does not understand, she is troubled and vulnerable to Pierce. This sudden frailty, which she did not know, makes her doubt her own ability to survive alone and question all she had learned about herself. And while her certainties collapse, he jubilates and plays with her, unaware of what he is destroying.

Pierce notices a change in the yellow look of his captive, it darkens and her fine features harden. Her lips turn up on her fangs when she says dryly:

"Get me off and I'll show you how much I want you."

Pierce slightly retreats at first, surprised by the alteration of the atmosphere in the room, suddenly tense. Then resumes, displaying again an expression full of confidence, his blue eyes shining with excitement in front of the challenge that the beast launches to him.

While she does not let go of his gaze, he slowly defects the ties to her ankles and then to one of her hands. She struggles to contain her impatience and tries to anticipate in her mind the first movements of Pierce to retain her. There remains only one strap to detach, he lingers more than on the previous ones.

"I'll be as sweet as poss ..."

The light of the room suddenly disappears, interrupting him, replaced by a rotating beacon whose red light turns on the ceiling and projects itself onto the white walls of the medical room, at the rhythm of a strident siren that seems to come from everywhere around them.

Stunned eyes turned towards the ceiling, Pierce swears, remembering that this type of alert is reserved for extreme cases of escape. When his eyes land again on the bed, it is empty.


	3. Chapter 3

The red light flashes of the rotating beacon greatly reduce their visibility, and the shrill siren screams so hard that their eardrums pulsate painfully. It looks like hell. 

Pierce turns on himself, his eyes wide open and his weapon unsheathed. He scrutinizes all around him with anxiety but at each rotation of the beam he thinks he sees a movement in the opposite corner. It is only when the bed is pushed in his direction that he finally finds the beast, amazed by his skill in hiding in such a small room with so little furniture.

The beast jumps on the bed and propels itself against Pierce's torso, who drops his weapon when his back hits the ground. His face tightens and a raucous complaint escapes from his throat when he reflexively brings his hands to his chest and realizes that the acute pain he suddenly feels is due to the claws of the mutant that are planted there.

He grabs her wrists but she is literally crouched on his chest and pushes with all her weight on her hands, slashing a little more the flesh at every attempt of Pierce to repel it, soon snatching more intense cries of pain. The chaotic atmosphere and Pierce's panicked gaze stir up her predatory instincts, obliterating all rational thought. Leaning over his face, the beast growls, showing her fangs and threatening to bite his neck just when the light comes back as suddenly as it had extinguished.

The siren still screams but the clear view of Pierce's contrite face and his stunned eyes slows down her momentum. Out of her trance, she freezes, realizing that she has just wounded him to the point of blood. Pierce finally manages to push her claws out of his skin in a sigh of relief. She expects him to reply immediately, that he tries to get up by throwing her to the ground, but he does not move, his hands still holding her wrists.

For a few seconds of fluctuation, she no longer knows if she is supposed to kill him or to apologize. He's still holding her hands against the blood-soaked fabric on his chest when he raises his head with an undecipherable look.

"You can't leave." Pierce says calmly, he seems to establish a fact more than an order or a threat; making her even more confused.

"What?" she asks with a disconcerted air.

Amused by her reaction, his mouth forms a soft smile as he releases her wrist and brings his hand to her face, gently brushing her cheek with his fleshy fingers.

At this moment, she no longer hears the siren. A wave of chills spreads over her skin to his touch, a deep breath exhales from her mouth allowing her muscles to slowly release the tension she had strongly maintained until then.

To surrender to him is all that her body desires and all that she has fought since meeting this man and his intense blue eyes. He should be angry, he should counterattack and punish her for what she did, but instead he gently touches her with a serious look on his face. Now the beast feels about to let go, her face slowly attracted by Pierce's hand towards his own.

The door violently opens and all of a sudden her senses return to reality, to the medical room, to the sound of the alarm, and to Pierce, the man who has captured her and who has been playing with her ever since, on the ground beneath her feet, his breast bleeding from the claws she has planted. She must seize the moment.

The man in the white coat who has just entered has scarcely time to push himself when the captive runs through the door, the sound of her bare feet on the ground almost undetectable.

"No, grab her!" Pierce screams at the dazed man, then he screams something again, but she's already too far away in the corridors to hear his words.

After getting up, Pierce starts in pursuit of the fugitive, crossing the building and frantically throwing glances in the rooms and the cells that he crosses, all empty.

"Where is she, where did she go?" He asks the two nurses running towards him.

"Who ?"

"How that, who ?" He yells furiously at the woman's face.

"But they're all on the run, sir, all the patients..." she moans, panicked.

Pierce froze, the time to process the information. "Shit, shit, SHIT!" he yells as he resumes his race. When he crosses three of his men on the way to the elevator, which revealed that they had not seen her pass, he learns that several of Dr. Rice's patients managed to escape, presumably helped by nurses from the Center. Guessing that the confusion created by all these people running in all directions in the building could only be to the advantage of the fugitive, Pierce summons one of his men to accompany him to the parking lot.

When he uncovers it, he distinguishes a form on the ground, near parked cars, and runs nervously toward it. Lying on his stomach, a man bathes in a pool of blood seeming to come from his abdomen and his neck is no more than a scarlet pulp. On his forearm, shreds of bandages reveal a trace of recent bite, the scarring has hardly begun. This is the only trace that the beast left behind. 

The breeze carries with it the warm and damp odors of earth and wood that she knows so well. This passage among civilization strengthens her in her choice not to belong to it. The forest has not changed much since her departure, only the wind is warmer and the clouds of insects more numerous and denser, confirming that the summer has indeed arrived.

She had to travel at night to the north, hiding on the rooftops of buses or in the back of passing pick-ups. Going unnoticed almost naked in this hospital outfit was not easy but she could not see how to ask people for help with her appearance. Two nights had been necessary to reach Durango and get closer to home.

Now, perched on a branch high enough not to be seen from the ground, hidden by the dense foliage, she observes below the entrance of her den, a cave half buried in the ground whose entrance easily passes unnoticed if we do not dwell on it. She waits patiently for something to move, as she has often done since returning two days earlier. 

Like the first time, she feels him before she even sees him. His smell now engraved in her memory, she could feel it for miles, but he is not so far and slowly approaches the place which, despite its discretion, revealed her presence at the origin. He is alone and, although she expected, his insolent assurance makes her smile.

Pierce sinks and enters and then comes out almost immediately, realizing that the place is empty. He sits on the trunk lying on the ground near the entrance, places his jacket there and lights a cigarette. A bandage protrudes from the collar of his black tank top. During the hours that the animal passes by observing him, he sometimes prowls around the lair, freezing at the slightest noise, the hand on the butt of the weapon at his girdle. However, the beast does not detect an ounce of fear in his attitude, only the impatience that echoes her own, that of confronting him again. And she is as anxious, as irrational as it seems to her, to find herself near him.

Pierce rises, his muscles begin to become numb by dint of sitting while the light is declining. After a few trips back to the entrance of the cavity, his hands in his back, he decides to return inside the cave. He lights a torch to illuminate the interior, now totally dark. The cave is surprisingly more spacious than it looks from the outside, allowing even a man to stand upright.

As he inspects the ground with his torch light and distinguishes between the leaves and the dry soil a doe skin probably supposed to serve as a bed, Pierce is suddenly pushed in the back and strikes the wall. He then pivots with his fist raised but the beast blocks his movement with his forearm, strong enough to make him let go the lamp that rolls on the ground behind her, casting their shadows on the wall. She grabs him by the throat with her free hand, blocking him against the wall and trying to maintain sufficient pressure to deter him from moving. Only, seeing his smile widen in the semi-darkness that subsists above the lamp's beam, she understands that something is wrong; she then feels the cannon of a weapon sticking to her belly.

"Nice try, baby, but you should stick to your strategy of killing in the second." He says, leaning his head to one side.

"Fuck you!" She says.

"Ha, it reminds me of our encounter ..." Pierce goes on, disengaging himself from the grip of the beast to catch the nape of her neck with his free hand, pushing a little more the canon under her ribs.

"You made me wait baby! Why do you do this to me, I've been tender with you the last time ..." he says with an exaggerated condescending look on his face.

"Only to humiliate me, you thought I could do nothing against you ..."

"Oh baby, you're breaking my heart, I'm here for you ..." he replies with a falsely warm smile.

"To bring me back to this shitty place, you're a heartless son of a bitch ..."

"Jeez, for sure you talk dirty when you talk! Let's be nice, okay, or you could be hurt ..."

"I won't come back," she firmly interrupts, her yellow eyes piercing through Pierce's gaze.

"So why are you here? If you wanted to kill me, I'd already be torn to pieces, right?" he adds with a heavy tone of innuendo.

She feels the nervousness rise in her again as Pierce starts to mock her attraction to him. The beast tries to retreat but he does not let her do it and draws her closer to him, tightening his hand on the back of her neck.

"I know you're smarter than that so you knew I was coming here, you were waiting for me ..." he whispers, his breath on her face, "You're so mine, you can't help it."

Recalling what Pierce told her about the dominant male, she cursed this doctor for telling him about these things he since never stopped using against her.

"You don't know what you're talking about," she says bitterly.

"Fuck no, it's all crap for me!" he mocks before taking a more serious expression. "But you do act funny with me and, strangely, it turns me on baby ..."

She puts her head down, trying to avoid his approaching face and to chase his last words out of her head, but Pierce mimics her movement and makes his way to her lips. For a moment, she loses her breath and the will to push him away, until she feels his tongue invade her mouth unceremoniously. His hand presses her face firmly against his and she can feel the cold metal of his gun through her blouse as he clasps her back with his arm.

She can hardly breathe, moaning, desperately trying to close her mouth, to regain control of her body. She tries to push him back with her arms, slipping them between their bodies but he tightens his hug more, until she bites his lip. Surprised by the pinch, he finally let go, tasting the salt of the blood in his mouth.

"Damn, you're really something, darling," he says, wiping the blood on his chin with a black look, "You like it rough, huh? You're gonna love this."

At that moment, she knows she should get out of reach, run away immediately, but she is tetanized by the attitude of Pierce. Despite all she had done to him, he had never seemed to be furious, not at that point.

The beast can feel the anger and an unhealthy excitement rise in him as he grabs her again by the neck with an evil smile on his face, and pushes her brutally against the ground, her face almost hitting the dirt.

Pierce throws his pistol and kneels over the beast that tries to crawl out of his reach but he grabs her head and presses it against the ground, his metal fingers tangling painfully in her hair.

Her mind is overwhelmed by panic, unable to think clearly about what she needs to do to escape, or whether she should do it, or whether she really wants to. It is only when she feels the fingers of Pierce raising her blouse on her back that her body stiffens and agitates to unbalance him, but he blocks her against the ground and stretches with all his weight.

His breath is raucous and as heavy on her neck as his body is. The breathless screams of the beast suddenly clamp in her throat when a burning pain pierces her between her legs, while Pierce brutally presses his pelvis against her ass.

He rumbles deeply, breathes loudly in jerks, the muscles of his belly stretched against the back of his prisoner, pulling a little harder on her hair. The beast struggles to catch her breath, even after feeling him enter into her again, and again, each strike seeming deeper and more brutal than the previous one.

He finally releases her hair and grabs her hips to pull her harder and faster against him. She frantically searches the ground in front of her but her claws find nothing to cling to, catching only dirt and branches. Her mind is cloudy, uncertain if the stinging contractions that ravage her belly cause her suffering or intense pleasure, unable to say whether it is hatred or adoration that she now feels for this man who possesses her so fiercely.

"That's what you wanted, right?" he whispers in her ear, passing his hands under her chest, clinging to her breasts. The face buried in the neck of the beast, Pierce accentuates his cadence and kisses with avidity her burning skin. She lets out an acute and breathless scream when he bites her flesh, he can feel the muscles at the base of her neck stiffen under his tongue.

"Oh damn, I'm going to ..." A deep rattle forms in his throat as he reaches ecstasy in one last charge.

Lying on her, his hands resting on her loins and his sweaty forehead caressing her cheek, their gasping breaths create a cloud of dust swirling in the torch's beam.

Minutes pass and they remain motionless. The beast feels exhausted, tired of this internal struggle between opposing feelings. He had just been all that she hates in a man, their insolent thoughts that everything belongs to them, that they direct everything without an ounce of doubt or empathy. But at the same time, it felt so damn right, just as things were supposed to be for her, in the arms of the one who deserves her, the one she deserves.

In her head emerges the idea that he probably delivers the same inner fight without the ability or the urge to put the finger on it, let alone to accept it, hiding behind any excuse his job may provide him to do what he has to, instead of what he longs to. She already apprehends his next insensitive reaction, only to find her fears confirmed when he finally retires and sees the blood that stains his sex and his thighs.

"What the fuck is that?" he asks with an air of astonishment.

His gaze oscillates between his crotch and the face of the beast that looks up at him, until he understands what it is. Then, in a mocking tone, he exclaims: "Shit, you were a virgin?"


	4. Chapter 4

What a strange feeling, like no other felt before. Her flesh burns and vibrates, trying to reproduce the same sensation as when Pierce penetrated it. It feels unsatisfied, hungry, longing for more of him. She would have loved to freeze that moment forever, with him so close lying on her, in her, feeling his heart beat against her back, his sweaty skin almost merging with hers in that quiet embrace.

But that was without counting with his messed up mind, his torn feelings toward what she is. That would have been perfect without the bitter taste in her mouth and the sudden void in her chest as Pierce pulls out of her and ruins it all, not having a second thought before opening his mouth. Couldn't he just imagine one second that her body had never desired anyone before him? Even she didn't know, even less hoped, that it could happen to her.

She thought she could bear again his apparent insensitiveness and keep on trying to open his eyes, in that weird and violent way that seemed to suit them from the beginning. But her heart had been hurt more than she expected and the words "he will never accept you" wouldn't stop harassing her brains, making her vulnerable and weak not knowing how to handle all that mess in her head, making her angry.

"Fucking asshole!" she spits, enraged, pushing him back with a furious kick on his chest. Pierce falls down, his chest painful from the still fresh wounds her claws had caused, that her hit makes bleed again.

She gets on her feet and flees outside, not letting him a chance to figure out a trick to retain her again.

Speechless and kind of dizzy, Pierce ignores the pain while trying to understand what had just happened. He messed up, that's his obvious conclusion, but he's not sure when. In any case he cannot let her escape; too many things are at stake and not only from a professional point of view. But that's a reflection he quickly chases from his thoughts as he dresses in a hurry and grabs his flashlight from the ground to go after her.

The light provided by the torch inside the den was already not that much, but outside it is almost useless compared to the deep darkness of the forest around him. Too late to think it through, with her speed she could be out of reach by that time and only an intuition puts him on her path, as some owls seem to be disturbed by something a few meters away on his left.

His eyes progressively get used to the darkness even though they can't see in the dim light as much as hers. The moon still provides enough clarity for him to avoid obstacles while running toward the hoots.

Running fast between the trees, trying to not stumble on every root he crosses, the owls seem to never be closer, like he's running without going forward, until he sees something move ahead of him, a furtive clear silhouette. He thinks it's her in that once white medical blouse, he yells "WAIT!" but it won't stop, disappearing again in the shadows.

If he was like her, he would have felt all the eyes of the forest on him, scrutinizing him as his breath gets panting and hoarse and his lungs start to burn. He slows down; the silhouette is nowhere to be seen. If he was like her he would have known he should not stop there, he would have felt his hairs stand on his skin at the danger approaching, at the glowing eyes already surrounding him. But all he hears is his heart pounding strongly inside his ears and his noisy breaths that he tries to calm down.

As he bends, with his hands on his knees, his head down, cursing himself and cursing her, a slight growl catches his attention. He raises his head, searching for the source of the sound in the dark all around him. She growls too, he recalls how she did when they met. But she has only two eyes and what he sees are many more, all around him. The growl approaches, soon multiplying, until he finally distinguishes the animals producing it.

Far from the appealing silhouette his beast has, they are as tense and as intimidating as she can be; the wolves. A whole pack, at least eight of them, grey and black, slowly getting closer, their head low and their sharp fangs in their jaws clenched in a ferocious grimace.

"No need to panic", Pierce thinks, until he searches on his belt for his gun which isn't there, forgotten in the den. "Fuck" he swears, and cautiously starts to back off with his hands raised in front of him and a cold shiver in the back of his head.

The predators step closer again, their growls louder, he hears them also behind him and searches desperately for a way out in the dark spaces of the vegetation when a rustling behind him attracts the attention of the wolves, interrupting their aggressive vocals.

"Run", Pierce recognizes the voice of the beast and turns around to see her emerge from the shadows. He sighs in relief louder than he intended to.  
"Baby, I..."  
"Run!" she interrupts him with a harder voice.

Pierce freezes in disbelief, not understanding the tension he perceives in the beast attitude, is it fear he sees in her eyes? The wolf he saw first coming at him suddenly passes him by like he wasn't there and ferociously growls while jumping at her. She dodges it from a series of trills on the side.  
"Run" she whispers in a breath, her eyes glowing like the wolves' but they are not threatening, they are imploring Pierce before she starts to run away. The whole pack moves as one and follows her, barking from rage and excitement, leaving Pierce astonished where he stands.

A few seconds was all he needed to regain his spirits, deciding what to do and find his way back to the den. He never thought it was possible but he did run faster than before, hoping he would find her again and not too late. He couldn't stop thinking about her, how she had caught the wolves' attention so easily and wondering why. And the way she had looked at him, her precise moves weren't made out of fear, not for herself at least.

By the time Pierce finds her, dawn is rising and bringing the fog with it, resting on the green carpet of the woods before the sun gets to dry it. The beast is among it, her body lying on the side as if asleep, her short black hair denoting in the soft colors of the landscape.

He hesitates for a second, holding his breath, he knows he would care if she's dead and that's not of his liking. On another hand she has proven to be full of surprises so he finally approaches, watching her back for any breathing movement, intensively listening for any moan of pain.

He's upon her when he finally sees her back rise slightly, he then allows himself to breathe too. Crouching next to her, Pierce reaches for her back but stops short when she jerks. Taking back his hand, he decides to break the silence instead.

"What was that? I thought you were one of them" he chuckles slightly.

After seconds that seemed to stretch indefinitely, he hears her mumble with a blank voice :  
"I'm not like them, I'm not like you...  
I'm alone"

Pierce feels relief at hearing her speak but she hadn't still moved, he starts wondering if she's seriously wounded but the only noticeable thing is the reddish growing stain on the side of her already dirty blouse.

"You're bleeding..." He tries to touch her but she harshly shouts, shaking her back "don't touch me! "

"Easy, baby!" he says, raising his hands. But she does not react any further, staying still on the ground, looking weak somehow, a surprisingly unpleasant sight for him, he doesn't really know how to undo that feeling in a way he wouldn't feel awkward about.

"Yeah, well... Time is up baby, Rice should be coming with my guys in a few hours so you might wanna get a little clean..." he launches, trying to sound provocative.

"I don't care" she interrupts him in the same low and monochord voice.

That's not what he expected. He knows she has a temper and enough tenacity in her to not give up so easily. Somehow he hopes so, that's what he wants from her or she may never survive the tests at Transingen. But that's as far as he pushes his thoughts, refusing to further acknowledge their strange bond, denying the true reasons he's not just roughly tying her up and taking her to Rice. She's just a mutant after all.

"Are you gonna cry for a few wounds, mutie? " he starts to shout.

Still no reaction. He's getting confused now, crouched next to her back, an ounce of guilt tickling the back of his mind.

"Fuck," he heavily sighs, "I didn't know you were..., I... Didn't mean to hurt you..."

"You think I'm hurt?" she cuts with a hint of nervousness in the voice.

She finally raises her head, straightening her bust, resting on her hands and turning to him. She has bruises on her face; her hair is a mess with dried blood and dirt in it, she has nasty bites on her arms and a considerable laceration on her stomach bleeding through her torn blouse.

She addresses him with a furious gaze: "You think I give a shit you made me bleed?" she says, aggressively raising her voice. "You think you hurt me when you laid your hands on me? Hell, I craved for it! You could even kill me with your own hands I would fucking love it the same, that's how fucked up you got me!"

"You shut up woman!" Pierce suddenly yells with an annoyed look, making her silent and astonished; had he just called her woman? He nods his head and heavily sighs, trying hard to push away the pressing need to hug her.  
"Damn you..." he blows, just before grabbing the back of her neck and pressing his lips on hers in an avid kiss.


	5. Chapter 5

She floats. At least that's what she feels; light body, numb limbs and fleeting thoughts.

"Hello dear Sara."

The voice of a man rushes into her head and digs in her memories to tear painfully images from the depths of her mind, images that she did not want to see again.

"I'm Dr. Rice."

At this name, her eyelids quiver, the effort she must provide to open them seems considerable, and in doing so, her body seems more and more heavy. The man in front of her, whose features are still fuzzy, is wearing a white coat. But by the time her senses come back to her a little, she already remembers that name.

"Gently dear, you have been sedated for several days ..."

"Where ..." she manages to mumble in a rocky voice, her dry throat feels so raw. "Where is he ..." she breathes again, grimacing.  
"It doesn't matter" Rice cuts, "what matters is you Sara, and what you are able to do. I tried to reproduce your transformation but it seems that you have to be aware ... "continues the doctor.

"PIERCE" she finally manages to growl with an angry look, annoyed by Rice's insistence to ignore it.

The man freezes, a satisfied pout on the face, then gets up and goes away a few seconds, leaving the field of vision of the beast. She looks at the objects around her, machines connected to her arm with screens that beep to the rhythm of her heart rate, pockets of translucent liquid and medical equipment but she does not recognize the walls, nor the smells nor the sounds, she does not feel either the temperature of the room or the slightest movement in her body.

The man comes back with a tablet on which is placed a black screen that he slides in front of the face of the beast.

"What do you remember Sara, do you know how you got here?" Rice asks.

The beast searches her memory, realizing that she has no idea where she is, how she got there and, above all, how this man knows that name he keeps saying. And why is not Pierce here? She does not smell him, neither around her nor on her. Yet the last thing she remembers is him; his hands on her, his skin against hers, his lips on hers. Once the wolves had left, finally sure of their victory against the strange animal who covets the same prey as they, he had found her.

She remembers his steel blue eyes, greedy and urgent, when he tore her blouse from top to bottom, to touch and to taste her, with the savagery that he only knew when in contact with the beast. While his bestiality increased as their caresses and kisses grew, she had never felt as human as at that moment.

He had taken her again, without regard for her wounds, shedding blood on their bodies with his hands of flesh and metal that she no longer tried to differentiate. Without more sweetness than before but this time she was ready, she had welcomed the burn between her legs with impatience and relief. She had stripped him and tore off the bandage on his chest that covered his wounds, she had licked the blood that was oozing, he had a strong, powerful taste. He had clutched her back so hard that his fingers seemed to print on her skin.

Sitting on her knees, her hands lost in her blonde hair, she had hugged him hard, burying her face in her neck, when her belly contracted, creating a shudder that waved and then swelled to finally explode and scatter everywhere inside. But she had not explained these sensations unknown until then, she had only felt complete for the first time in her life.

Sitting on his thighs, her hands lost in his blonde hair, she had hugged him tightly. Wrapping her legs around his back, burying his face in her neck and against her chest as he lifted her, he had sank into her, loudly moaning until their bellies contracted, creating a shudder inside her that had waved, then swelled to finally explode and scatter everywhere inside. She had not tried to understand, she only knew that she had felt complete for the first time in her life.

She remembers it. By reliving this moment she can almost feel the texture of his skin again.  
Then it's dark. Rice seems to understand at her frowning that her memory is lacking and turns on the screen.

The image on the screen flickers a little, but it is the jerkiness of the filmer who is the cause. Her eyes try to make the point, she distinguishes trees and recognizes the characteristic light of the place. It's at her place. The image comes to a standstill and zooms into an extended form on the ground. Two men approach, those of Pierce to believe their outfits and their mechanical members, and tend two poles with a collar at their end that they tighten around the extended form. When the latter moves and raises the head, the beast freezes on her seat, understanding that it is her.

She sees herself searching frantically around her, her naked body stained with dried blood unveiled through the torn blouse, while the men shout "Hold it!"

She's looking for Pierce, she understands it at the panicked look that the camera is filming in close up. She pays no attention to the men who end up brutally tightening the collars around her neck to pull her back, causing her to fall to the ground, and then drag her as she struggles vociferously, trying to pull the cables that strangle her.

The men who hold her start to run through the trees, the ones around them follow them, their weapons unsheathed, and they laugh at her screams. She only sees their backs on the screen, the cameraman has not gone nearer but he laughs too, he comments "This thing is hysterical!"

Then the laughter suddenly stops. "What is happening ?" blows the man at the camera, moving slowly. The men are silent and motionless, they exchange looks and then look away, where her attackers are, when a cry resounds, like a roar, an animal scream that echoes all around them and that she cannot identify in front of the screen.

The image starts bouncing again, still filming the men running in front. By joining them, one sees only the ground while the men swear in a tight voice.

"Oh damn ..." nervously blows the cameraman while straightening his camera. The man steps back while zooming. The image still flickers but this time it is the trembling hand of the cameraman who is the cause. It shows a creature that breaks the poles that held it and jumps on the chest of one of the attackers and plants there its long claws. The man's screams only stop when his face disappears in a sheaf of blood, carried by a new blow of claws, before his body collapses on the ground.

The enlargement does not allow to see sharp outlines but the beast knows that it is still her, she cannot explain it but she recognizes herself in this being. Her fangs are prominent and her skin is darker, almost black, but especially, her eyes are larger, incandescent yellow, and the look she has on the men around her is fierce and ruthless.

She grunts as if her throat could not produce any other sound, let alone articulate words, and she attacks each man in turn who could not get away in time, cutting off their limbs and tearing out their throats with her jaw without others reacting, petrified by the spectacle before them. Her skin is so dark that the wounds caused by the wolves are not visible on her arms and belly, but she glows, made shiny by the fresh blood that springs from her victims, although only the rags of the reddened blouse really testify to the relentlessness she shows towards her preys. She has nothing human anymore.

The beast does not notice the tears her clawed fingers made in the padding of the seat, her fists clenched at the bleached knuckles, nor the beeps that accelerate to the rhythm of the beating of her heart that knocks harder in her chest. What she sees is Pierce's abandonment, absence, betrayal. How this man manages to provoke feelings so extreme, so exacerbated, it exceeds her understanding. She has gone from fury to submission, from fear to passion, from fullness to chaos. This creature on the screen both fascinates and frightens her. Guided by rage, she abandoned all conscious thought, all desire for restraint, all humanity. She is exactly as men have always considered her, as he no doubt considers her; an animal without soul.

The men in the picture begin to waver seeing the beast now turn to them.  
"Fucking kill her!" shouts one of them to his colleague who is clumsily trying to grab his pistol from his belt. As he points it toward the mutant who runs towards them, the camera wobbles as the wearer begins to recoil, when a voice sounds behind him.

"STOP!"

A slight metallic snap echoed at his word. The beast is still heading towards them, right on the screen, but she seems to slow down, then stops and carries a hand to her belly to pick up a dart ended by a yellow feather duster that drops on the ground. Her head wobbles, then her whole body, before collapsing on the floor like a disjointed puppet.

The mercenaries sigh and swear at the same time as they look at the man who enters the field of the camera and hands his rifle to one of them without a word.

The beast holds her breath and her jaw tightens. Here he is finally, Pierce. His face remains turned towards the creature lying on the ground. Its skin gradually clears as he moves toward it and kneels. She does not see his face; she can only see in his blonde hair in battle the traces of their antics. But this thought does not soften her. He holds out an arm but she does not see that he tries to cover her chest with the strips of fabric of what was once a blouse.

"Turn off the camera," he orders dryly without looking back. And the screen becomes black again.

Her throat is dry when she wants to scream. A tingle rises from her nose to her eyes but the rage is too great to let the sadness prevail. Her neck suddenly stiffens and her heart races, the machine beeps almost like an alarm while the oscilloscope struggles to trace the curves more and more closely spaced on the small screen.

Rice has not stopped watching her, a smile on his face and a hand on a box that controls the rate of perfusion in her arm. He presses one of the buttons several times at the sight of the jaw of the beast that stretches out and to her possessed look. The mutant, without even noticing it, relaxes, then goes back to sleep in the second.

Rice is satisfied. He now knows for sure which buttons to press.


	6. Chapter 6

The tests seem satisfactory to him. Reading the latest results on the way to his office inspires Dr. Rice new steps in experiments on current subjects. Eyes on the tablet he holds in his hand, he stops when an unexpected presence appears on the edge of his vision as he enters his room.

"Mr. Pierce?" he asks, tilting his head in surprise. "I thought you were on a mission. Unless ..."

"Dr. Rice ..." Pierce says hurriedly, looking up, hands behind his back. "We have tracked down the last fugitives."

"All right, all right," Rice says, skirting Pierce, raising his eyebrows as he sits down, taking a quick glance at the documents on his desk; almost all reports about the beast. "And what can I do for you?"

"This has arrived for you," Pierce answers, popping up a cardboard folder full of documents from behind his back, which he filed in front of Rice, trying to support his gaze, "the lab ..."

"Yes thanks." cuts Rice, clasping his hands on the pile of documents. "Anything else, Mr. Pierce?" he questions with a falsely detached air.

After a brief silence of hesitation, Pierce asks "Progress with the new subject?"  
Rice leaves the question in suspense for a moment, while a vague smirk is formed on his face, and gives Pierce a conciliatory look, a sign that he suspected the reason for the visit.

"Sara, do you mean?"

"Sara? You gave her a name?" Pierce asks, sincerely stunned.

"No, Mr. Pierce, that's her name." Rice opens a drawer and pulls out a new cardboard folder, more worn than those scattered on his desk, opens it and hands it to Pierce. "A newborn was left at the door of St. Mary's Church in San Antonio on February 27, 2004. He was entrusted to St. Joseph's Orphanage and named Sara." He summarizes.

"Female, Hispanic type, yellow eyes and teeth like little fangs, ..." Pierce reads before closing the file and handing it to the doctor, nodding his head knowingly.

"Sara then, her lack of reaction to the mention of this name suggests to me that she has deliberately overshadowed this part of her life, which is admirable since she spent the first fourteen years of her life there" says Rice resting the file from where he had taken it.

"Our little wild thing has spent more than ten years in the woods?" Pierce notices, trying to contain his astonishment behind a contemptuous smile.

"She's exceptional, very promising. I might need you soon, though." Rice says, getting up.

Pierce freezes, fearing to ask the reason for this request given the nature of the tests Rice routinely did to his subjects, and responds with a perplexed frown.

"You are her trigger, Mr. Pierce, and her catalyst. The mere mention of your name won't soon be enough to trigger her transformation. And things should soon accelerate."

Rice waves toward the door without waiting for an answer, meaning it was time for his visitor to leave. The enigmatic expression on his face had not escaped Pierce who, once in the corridor that leads him to the exit of Transingen, hastens with a sigh to remove the document slipped on his back under the belt to put it in the inside pocket of his jacket.

The purring that envelops her body soothes her and, most of all, the smell. It warms and reassures her. It is a little diffuse, musky, sometimes supplanted by the smell of oil which, once dissipated, leaves it the entire place.

It had been weeks since she had felt so good, that she had not felt her own body, her weight, her warmth, her presence. No doubt it was a new product, a new test to define her limits. She had never begged, never even spoken. He had cracked it a couple of times, though. She had felt her reason collapse and her body burn from within, as if all the rage of the world was consuming her, and when she opened her eyes, everything was devastated, broken and lacerated, and he smiled. And yet, he continued, this doctor, this monster. The more she resisted, the more he seemed to take pleasure in what he was doing to her, the samples and other analyzes, the external stimuli and the methods of restraint, of confinement sometimes.

He was trying to reach another stage, the one where she would be nothing more than sheer fury, gaunt, but she had no idea how to do that, she had no control over that state. She just wanted everything to stop.

So, if it is a new method, she welcomes him with open arms, as long as it makes her feel so serene.

After weeks of alternating drowsiness, daze, sleeps without dreams and brutal awakenings, her mind is exhausted. She does not understand where the soft heat that warms her skin at times comes from, or the whirlpools that rock it. She hardly realizes that she is dreaming now, and in her dream she sees Pierce. He turns his back on her, his silhouette against the dazzling light. He drives, his bare arm stretched out in front of him, his mechanical hand holding the steering wheel, and he looks at her. His blond hair is plated back and his blue eyes are indecipherable behind sunglasses. But he smiles. Not the grimace he makes when he threatens her, that sneer-smirking smile, but the one who reassures her, sincere, and that makes all her fears disappear. She dreams that this sleep never stops.

But she does not dream. Her blood, still saturated with tranquilizers and other drug cocktails that she has been given all this time, is struggling to regenerate, to purify itself. They have been driving for hours, the day has come after dark, and the sun is warming her face when, by chance, the angle of the vehicle allows it's rays to make their way inside the vehicle, right up to the bench in the back where she is lying, dressed in clothes she does not know, her wrists caught in a black plastic handcuff.

She does not move, for a long time. She is not sure she can trust what she sees or feels. Yet it is the smell of Pierce that fills the cabin and reassures her, beyond all reason. This is his voice that she recognizes in his punctuated mumblings when he hums what looks like a song, without leaving the road. But she waits.

The vehicle stops and the engine stops running. Looking back, Pierce checks that the beast is still asleep and then gets off the vehicle. On his return, it is only by closing the door that he stealthily sees two angry yellow eyes in the rearview mirror. He would want to turn around to check that he did not dream but two arms come out of the back and fall back on his neck, pressing his head against the headrest and clasping his neck between wrists attached.

"Hey, slept well baby?" Pierce launches, as happily as the pressure on his neck allows.

The beast hesitates; her mind still confused does not know where to start.

"If you want something, just ask, baby, I just made provisions" he continues without hesitation.

Pierce tries to meet her eyes in the rearview mirror, clumsily dropping his glasses. The beast displays an anxious look, looking for something to hang on beyond the empty, dusty parking lot in front of them. He knows that by confronting her right in the eyes he has more chances to get back on top. No doubt she knows that too, so she keeps her eyes off his face.

"Where ..." she stammers, her voice hoarse, "Where are we?"

"Everything is fine baby, calm down." Pierce grabs her wrists flexibly but does not hold them, trying to calm her down. "We crossed the border, we are on the American side."

"What ?! Why..., where are you taking me?" she gasps, visibly disoriented.

"In a safe place, everything is fine now, I got you out of the lab ..."

"Are you gonna finish the job, you didn't have time to do last time?" she cuts with a pressure on his throat.

"Come on, I'm not going to hurt you, baby ..."

"It's already done, asshole." She spits furiously, pulling again.

His body is stretched in his seat. Clenching his jaw and his grip on the wrists of the beast, he shouts: "STOP!"

At first petrified, as every time he raises his voice, her anger still picks up on her "You loved what you saw, that atrocious thing that killed your men? It was worth it, right?!" she hisses with bitterness.

"It's not what you think ..."

The situation was getting complicated. The warmth and tension of Pierce's neck against the skin of her arms, his scent intensifying as she tightened her grip and as the temperature in the cockpit increased, the perspiration beading on his mustache and temples, his pulse quickening every second and his hands holding her. Everything could overwhelm her at any moment. And why didn't he stop it? She had felt it the first time he had mastered her, his artificial hand could break her bones like little wood if he wanted to.

"I saved you, you hear me?! They were going to kill you, if I did nothing they would have killed you!"

Determination in his voice seems too sincere to be feigned. He can see from her lost gaze again that he has created doubt, that she tries to keep control but has difficulty in gathering her ideas.

 _He betrayed you_ , she repeats to herself constantly to remember why she does that, why he deserves it, why she must be furious with him. And yet, if there was not this seat between them, if his eyes met hers, she knows she could not stand up to him. She hates herself for the weakness he has revealed in her. She adds that to all the good reasons to blame him.

"But ... you left ..." she breathes.

"Looking for my things! I didn't know they would arrive so soon ..."

"SHUT UP, that's one of your fucking tricks again!" The beast suddenly tightens her grip on Pierce's throat and bangs her forehead against the headrest, hiding her face from the sight of Pierce, not knowing very well if it is to hide the tears that fill her eyes, or to hide the sight of him suffocating.

"No ..." he tries to pronounce, out of breath from his crushed trachea, "I promise you ... I ... will put you away ... even ... from me ..."


	7. Chapter 7

The pressure on his neck relaxes and the arms disappear behind his seat as quickly as they had appeared.

Pierce rushes out of the car, coughing, trying to catch his breath. Moving his hand mechanically through his hair, taking off the locks glued to his sweaty forehead, he sees her through the window, curled up on the seat, her face buried in her arms, and hesitates to drag her out to make her regret her ingratitude. But when he suddenly opens the door, she does not react, she does not turn around like a fury to defend herself, and that brings him back to that morning in the woods, when he thought she was dead. The same oppressive sensation he felt then grips his chest, and he forgets for a moment that she was on the brink of suffocating him, caught in a sudden urge to hold her in his arms.

"Fuck ..." he swears in a sigh, slamming the door sharply and going back behind the wheel without looking back.

The beast will not move from the trip. Pierce will not know that she cried to exhaustion until she fell asleep. She will refuse to admit it when she straighten up, her eyes swollen, because she does not do that, animals do not cry, why would she?

"What the hell are you crying about?" He asks with a mocking pout, turning to face her after stopping the vehicle.

Frowning, the beast gives him an angry look before putting her wrists to her mouth and biting the plastic link until it breaks, spitting it in the direction of Pierce with an air of defiance.

He looks down at the tie between the seats and raises an eyebrow.  
"What took you so long, baby?" he sneers disdainfully before getting out of the car.

When he opens the rear door to tell her to come down, he suddenly seems exhausted, the orange rays of the setting sun furrow under his red eyes and his footsteps are heavy, and his feet drag and stir the dust that strews the ground.

"What's the problem?" He asks the beast, leaning on the door jamb, trying to sound and look compassionate over his glasses.

She does not know what to answer. At once surprised and distrustful of this sudden kindness, no matter how forced it is on Pierce's part, but also because she does not know herself what caused such a relaxation in her, as if she could not help it. She was not even sure what had triggered it, the fact that she had almost killed the only person she had ever cared for, or to realize that, despite their strange compulsive attraction, they could never be together, for their own good.

So she says nothing and gets out of the car without a look at Pierce who shakes his head with a sigh of exasperation as she passes.

He takes a travel bag from the trunk of the SUV and then goes ahead to a blue door, similar to all the other blue doors that line up from side to side. A motel.

She enters a room that smells stale and dusty and where there is a bed, huge in his eyes, on which Pierce throws the bag and his glasses. On the side there is a table under the window and a brown armchair with a tattered fabric. At he back of the room, a door leads to what must be a bathroom. It does not seem more welcoming than the room where she was forcibly washed in Transingen, not so long ago, a month or two but it seems to her to be part of another life now.

"You see, this is a room, a bed, a table ..." he begins to enumerate sarcastically, pointing at the objects.

"What ?!" he exclaims to the furious gaze of the beast, raising his arms with a theatrical gesture, "I only make sure that you still know what a civilized life looks like, darling, because your little trips to the woods it's over if you want to stay alive. "

His expression had become very serious at that moment, but she could feel the anger in his voice, and his eyes, usually jokers, looked at her implacably.

It was unbearably hot in this room, bathed in the setting sun, which seemed to make the air red and unbreathable. Pierce did not seem to realize the nervousness he caused in her, raising his voice on her in such a confined and unusual space. This is an unknown territory for the beast. She does not know how to behave, she wants to snuggle into a deep black hole but there is nothing here that looks like this, and Pierce is there and he continues to talk to her, to lecture her with a voice strong and angry but she does not listen anymore and starts prowling around the room with clenched fists, spinning around like a caged tiger.

"Sara, stay fucking focused!" Pierce suddenly shouts.

She stops dead and faces him: "How did you call me?"

"How am I supposed to call you, sweetie, you never told me! You know that humans have names, do you?"

With a sudden gesture Pierce opens the bag he had placed on the bed and takes out a file that he throws on the table. He opens it and pulls out a card with a picture of her.

"Sara, it's your name and you'd better stick to it and not forget it, because that's what your IDs say from now on..." he continues with a smile which expresses no sympathy.

"It's not me ..." she starts shaking her head.

"I don't give a damn, sweetheart, it's the price to pay to stay alive. Forests, jungles, shrubs, Rice will rake everything to find you. You will have to live like a normal person, starting now : wear goggles and gloves, not smiling, not feeding on the fucking squirrels, all the mess! "

She is now trampling, she suffocates. She cannot believe what he tells her, it must be a new form of torture that Rice has found.

"There, you'll call this number," he says, showing a piece of paper that he puts on the table without softness "tomorrow, as soon as I get you off at the bus station, this person is helping people like you. Take tickets for the destination that you will be told, that you will pay in cash" he noisily slams an envelope on the pile of other documents, filled with banknotes.

She jumps, "Stop, Stop that shit!"  
Her voice is torn as she screams, holding her head in her hands. She rushes into the bathroom and slams the door before banging it, putting the hinges to the test.

"Perfect, you learn fast, baby! Very human like reaction!" he shouts, screaming through the door, before kicking the bed that slips on the carpet in a crack, before leaving the room, slamming the door too.

An unappreciated cigarette later, Pierce is back in the room. She did not leave the bathroom. He slumps into the chair and massages his temples with an upset mine. After hours on the road and attempted murder by the mutant he was trying to save in spite of herself, he might as well abandon everything and let it go. But it does not even cross his mind. He is just exhausted and tries to release the tension that has built up in his shoulders. Being in this room with her makes him nervous too, her unpredictability, her state and the ruthless creature she can become are not made to reassure him. But what worries him most is the appeal of her body. Like a magnet that attracts him, he could only think of that earlier, her flesh and softness, when she had wrapped her arms around him in a hug that was far from sensual in the car, and yet.

"Damn fool ..." he sighs, rubbing his eyes. 

He had been back in the room for a while now and had not moved since, from what she could hear. She had taken a shower, a strange feeling far from being unpleasant when she is a volunteer. She had thought, she had made a decision.

She goes out, the skin still wet and surrounded in a towel that had to know better days. Pierce is slumped on the armchair, his head leaning back on the backrest, his hands resting on the armrests, asleep.

She barely advances in silence on the carpet that he suddenly raises his head, his soldier's senses still sharpened. She freezes and scrutinizes his face, indecipherable in the darkness that now reigns in the room. He does not seem disoriented and looks at her as she moves slowly towards him, letting the towel slip on the floor.

He holds out an arm towards the wall near him and activates a switch that lights the bulb of the bedside table, dimly illuminating the room with a yellow glow. Then rest his hand on the armrest, as if nothing had happened. His eyes roam the body of the beast without letting any emotion emerge. These weeks spent undergoing tests have made her a little emaciated but firm muscles still roll under her matte skin. Her slow, assured step and her eyes gleaming in the semi-darkness give her a feline look that he did not know. He only notices that her hair has grown. She still has this black and shapeless hair but, so wet, it almost touches her shoulders now.

She reaches him, holding her breath as he stares at her belly, and finally he moves, carrying his metal fingers on the new scar there, left by the wolves. Under the tips of his fingers, the soft sensors perceive the roughness of the skin and he remembers how she saved his life that night. That makes them certainly even.

Eyes down on Pierce, standing between his legs apart, the beast breathes only when he gently lays his lips on her belly. There is no more anger in him. He puts his hands on her waist, squeezing her hips and pulling her to the chair, forcing her to rest her knees on his thighs and stick her sex against his chest. Running through her bruised skin with kisses, his hands caress her back, down to her buttocks, and massage her thighs up to her crotch where he lets his fingers linger, gently first, then by pressure more and more supported, tightening his embrace around her eagerly, burying his face in her abdomen as if he wanted to take refuge there.

Curled on his face, hands lost in his hair, she feels his breath hot and panting against her skin, reviving the fire that consumes her from the inside every time he touches her, the tingling of his beard that claws her when he rubs his face against her. Deep breaths lift his trembling back, in a mixture of relief and excitement. It is so hot in this room but her flesh shivers from the blood that boils in her veins. She would like to see his eyes, to know what they are expressing now. Grabbing his hair, the beast pulls his face back against the chair. Above his flushed cheeks, his blue eyes devour her as if she was a vital substance to his existence. His parted lips beg her without a word to feed on him in return.

"You're the worst thing that ever happened to me," she murmurs in a feverish breath on his face, planting her eyes in his.

His lips stretch in a slight, knowing smile; the feeling is reciprocal, before he draws to him the face of the beast and kisses her mouth greedily, invading it with his tongue, mixing his breath with hers while she moans under the pressure he exerts against her pelvis.

Pierce lifts her up suddenly, carries her hanging around his waist onto the bed where he drops on her. Pushing the bag unceremoniously down the floor with a thud, he kisses her and kneads her in his strong hands. His heavy body on hers, she restrains from tearing his clothes apart in that frantic haste so familiar to them now. The urge to touch his skin is almost unbearable.

She needs him stronger than ever before. She's been craving for him for so long. As time passed by, in her rare moments of awareness at that awful place where Rice had kept her, she had felt more and more eager to feel whole again, in the arms of the only being that releases the human in her. It all comes back to her now. Almost feeding on his scent, on all the skin she can touch and taste, she grabs his body wishing she had hundreds of hands. She curls up her body against his, marrying the shape of it, its posture, sucking his sighs and moans like so many things she will keep deep inside her to never forget.

It is so hot in this room but never this heat will be as intense as that created by the friction of their bodies, insatiably hungry of each other.

It is not the noise that has awakened him, but his absence. The glow that he distinguishes by opening his eyes tells him that the day has risen, but it is the absence of warmth at his side that makes him suspicious, sweeping the room with a glance still clouded by sleep.  
He is alone.

Putting the thoughts flowing in his mind on pause, he gets up in a hurry and fails to stumble on the rolled-up blanket on the floor as he rushes into the bathroom. Empty.

With a mechanical gesture, he puts on the trousers that had landed on the armchair and rushes open the door of the room. The sun is still chilly, its pale rays shave the lunar landscape that surrounds the small motel erected in the middle of the dust. But nothing moves.

Still refusing to hear the evidence hammering his brain, he returns to the room. The travel bag and the documents folder are gone. All he had brought for her, carried away. There is nothing left on the table but a piece of paper, with worn edges, almost crumpled by the so many times he has contemplated it since he stole it from one of the files on Rice's desk, two weeks ago. The two small clusters of whitish cells, so close and yet distinct, that spring on this murky black background, had been the ultimate trigger, the weight that had crushed all his doubts. He had to get her out of there, he had to save her, save them. She and the children she was carrying. Their children.

And they were gone now. He would never know where or when she would leave. He only knew that she knew. She had left that image as a goodbye letter saying that she understood and that everything would be fine.

Concentration is all he will need to lock up and forget the pain and regret in the hollow that forms in his chest. Not to think of the bitter taste in his mouth every time he wakes up realizing that he will not look at her again that day, that he will not touch her, that he will not know that piece of him that she carried away. Perhaps he will need a good dose of self-denial to pretend to look for her, constantly surveying the places where they have possessed each other, looking for traces that he will know not to find.

But it is the relief that prevails for the moment. She would probably only think of herself in the next few days but she would eventually follow the plan he had worked out for her, he is convinced. She had already taken matters into her own hands, avoiding them an annoying goodbye that would be so unlike them. Hunters like them do not languish; they do what they have to do.

So he does not linger in the room. He does not realize the absence of the tank top he was wearing the day before when picking his things, before taking the wheel, the course of his life he knows will not be quite the same anymore, but it does not matter. Pierce returns his glasses and his insolent smile on his face and resumes his mission, that of catching her kind.


	8. Epilogue

Light and fast steps succeed each other and then become silent. They resume, sometimes covered by the sound of the wind rustling the still young trees leaves and bushes that surround her, but she still knows exactly where the little feet are looking for her.

She may feel them approaching or sometimes moving away, covered from the ground where the wind has less hold on her. Motionless, her long black hair covers her face and mingles her with the shadows of the forest; a perfect camouflage.

She willingly leaves to school to socialize them. For her part, she prefers to teach them how to hunt. These exercises are as important to her as they are fun for her boys and she keeps making them harder every time she trains them, ensuring she always gets ahead of the dazzling progress she's been seeing them making.

A new squall bends the branches above before reaching her and suddenly her heart misses a beat. A flurry of images and memories floods her brain - a piercing blue glance, the feeling of a hand on her neck, the warmth of a hug. Contradictory feelings quarrel in her mind, she does not understand the joy and fear that are clashing at this moment. Only when her body shivers she manages to regain control of her will and realize: he is there.

She can't smell anything but him anymore, at once stupefied and numb, she cannot manage to capture the smell of her children. Their children! She cuts her breath so as not to disturb her hearing but they do not emit any noise, necessarily, they are so talented. She gets up hastily and scans over the foliage shrubs that the sun can barely reach through the tops of the trees above, but they are so small, nothing exceeds.

She would know it if something happened to them, she would feel it; they are a part of her. Despite this certainty, panic begins to invade her when she sees them moving again. The sounds come from two different places but come together and, to her greatest fear, move away from her.

This smell; they too know and feel it. She curses herself inwardly for not having thought of it before, for not having anticipated their reaction to something so familiar to them and at the same time unknown. All these mornings they had joined her in bed to be cuddled and found her curled up against this black tee-shirt still carrying a vague strange and attractive smell.

She starts to run. All her senses alert, she goes in their direction and feels the presence of the intruder grow as she advances. So she accelerates, her feet so fast on the ground that they hardly seem to touch it.

She finally sees them, two little blond heads who shine like the sun in the distance, side by side. She wants to shout, they come to her, but her lungs are too busy with her race so she can only emit a low growl that does not reach them.

Finally, she has almost reached them but they remain motionless and look straight ahead a high silhouette that is barely outlined between the shadows and dancing lights behind it. She decides to get around, out of the question that the boys are trapped between them.

Ignoring any precaution, she rushes through the vegetation, right on him as he suddenly turns his head in her direction. With a bound, she hit him with her whole body, knocking him a few feet down on the floor.

In the shock of the fall, he gasps and tentatively tries to push her arms in disordered gestures. She does not need to search it, she remembers his intervention gear perfectly as if she had met him yesterday; his holster on his belt and his knife on his ankle.

She blocks his legs by pressing her knees on his thighs, and slams his gloved hand to the floor. She remembers that this is how he hides his mechanical limb and how much he could hurt her with it. Her free hand at his belt, she blows the pressure that holds his weapon with a finger, grabs it by the butt and throws it out of reach of her boys in the thickets before ending her movement by grabbing his throat .

"Wow, baby! Yeah, I missed you too!" he jokes between two coughs.

Donald Pierce. Hardly had she put her big yellow eyes on his face that her heart is racing, as in the good old days. It's as if she had never left him; that captivating blue gaze under golden locks and that smirk, the warmth of his chest and arms that always draws her like a magnet. And that scent that emanates from him is more vivid than ever and fills her nostrils again; enveloping her body and mind as the sweet and reassuring memory of a home she thought she had lost forever.

Oh yes, she missed him. She no longer counted the times when she saw him on the faces of her children; they look so much like him.

She clings to this thought, to these two little beings who cannot tolerate any weakness on her part. In her heart of hearts, her desire and her instincts quarrel and pull her because she knows the unspeakable danger that he represents for them. She cannot let him be this time; she's not on her own anymore. She growls and squeezes his throat harder between her clawed fingers.

"What are you doing here, Pierce?!" she says in a guttural voice, so deep that even the children are staggering on their feet.

For a few seconds his insolent smile flickers, revealing a vague anxiety that she first chose to deny, fearing a subterfuge on his part.

"I'm here for you ..." he breathes painfully, the trachea crushed by the still firm grip she exerts on him.

"Where are they, your men?" she interrupts brutally.

"... I'm alone but ..." he grimaces and opens his mouth wide in search of air, she squeezes more and more.

His only free arm along his body, his fingers clench on loose earth. She suddenly wonders why he's not trying to grab her, to make her let go of him as he suffocates. She relaxes her fingers and feels under her palm pass the big gulp of air he swallows with eagerness.

She maintains the pressure but he remains lying down without the slightest sign of retaliation, without the slightest movement except that of his eyes that oscillate between her and the boys who are still watching them a few meters away, motionless and fascinated by the scene that unfolds before them.

Pierce watches them silently, a serious look on his face as she does not know him.

"You will come with me." He declares suddenly in an authoritarian tone, planting his eyes intensely in hers.

This sudden reaction disarms her for a moment, just enough to allow him to move his arm without her anticipating it and his hand falling on her calf. There, something stings and then a feeling of heat spreads in her leg.

When she understands, it's too late. She gives one last frightened look to Pierce who does not even seem to gloat; it does not look like him.

"No no!" she murmurs plaintively, throwing herself on the ground, reaching for her children who are flocking to her, but already her vision is darkening and her muscles are no longer responding. She is not even sure she could move or even drag herself to them; she no longer hears their frightened voices calling her nor feels the little hands that grip her when she loses consciousness.

"Hey there, sleepy head!"

There is an annoying buzz in her head and it seems as if her children are jumping on her skull when she opens her eyes. The mine annoyed by this painful awakening, she distinguishes through the windshield his boys playing in a small decrepit park outside, just a few meters from the car.

"They're fine, baby."

She already knows it because no alarm sounds in her head. The voice that reaches her ears comes from outside, near her, through the lowered window. She looks haggardly at the man talking to her. Perhaps she's still dreaming, it happens to her often, although it seems much more real than usual.

Donald watches her for a moment. He hesitates, his hand on the handle, and then finally opens the door when she looks at the twins who chuckle and run around the metal structure that was once a swing.

He walks right next to her and cautiously raises a bare hand that he slips under her hair and places it on the back of her neck. Her eyes seem to emerge from nothingness at his touch and she turns her face towards him.

"You ... are you really here?" she asks in a voice still veiled by sleep.

"Mmh ... yeah, and they too are really here." He responds, giggling, pointing a gloved finger at the park. "Sorry for the sting, darling, but you would never have complied otherwise." He adds with a furtive embarrassed grin.

Her spirits are gathering painfully in her head. She finally realizes she is in the passenger seat of a 4x4, parked near a tiny deserted rest area that seems lost in the middle of nowhere. It is daylight, the sun is still high and pale and the only thing holding her back is the seatbelt still attached.

Thousands of questions jostle in her head. When, where, how ... Why ?!

She sees Donald over there, landed in the woods near her house, his strangely calm attitude and worried face.

"Did you come for us?"

"Mmh mmh." He nods, looking at her seriously. His gaze is suddenly lost in the wave, he shakes his head and takes a sound inspiration and sighs. In his breath she perceives a rupture, a hesitation, as if he dared not breathe fully.

His palm is warm on her neck and his eyes are looking for a place to land on her face, or they rediscover her after almost five years of absence. His fingers gently squeeze the sides of her neck and a shy smile rounds the corner of his lips.

Donald looks hesitant; she does not know what to think. She watches him cautiously and fails to identify the emotion that seems to be crossing him when he suddenly leans over and presses his lips to hers.

Now she understands. Now with both his hands he holds her head against his, his tongue is burning in her mouth and when finally she clings to him, runs her arms around his back and presses his chest against hers, she feels his heart beating wildly.

 _Is it real? It is him that my hands touch, that my nose smells, that my eyes see? How far? Until when? At what price?_

Breathless and submerged by all kinds of feelings that flow into her all at the same time, she relaxes her embrace and retreats slightly, eyes down. Is it prudent to yield to her impulses?

He lets her do it, without holding it back, but clears his throat, scratching his head and looking as confused as she is.

"They ... they found us, right?" she stammers, struggling to regain composure.

"Yes ..., no, but they were close, I just got a little bit ahead." Pierce answers, looking up at her flushed face. She avoids his gaze, shrivels in her seat like a frightened animal.

A clear and joyful cry echoes outside, drawing their attention. The children climb together on the base of the metal turnstile and then jump with feet together into the sand below, uttering loud cries.

Donald and the beast look at them in silence for a few moments. The disorder immediately flew away and, as often since their birth, she is surprised to find herself smiling for no apparent reason.

"Do they know who I am?" Suddenly calls Donald.

She turns to him and observes with astonishment that he smiles too.

"Well, if you're in one piece it's probably because they understood it." She says with a smirk, revealing a sharp canine.

Donald raises an eyebrow, taken aback by what her answer implies.

"Is that so? They don't look mutant though ..."

"They're perfect, their fangs and their claws are retractable, so ..." She pauses then, taking a sudden, suspicious look at Pierce. "That's why you took us with you, because they look normal? What did you think, if they're like her I'll let them die there?" she calls out with a harsh voice, louder and louder.

Pierce recoils slightly and raises his hands in front of him.

"Wow, hold your horses, baby! I resigned, okay?"

"Oh yes, since when?" she continues, still aggressive.

"Yesterday!" he lets go in a burst of voice, his eyes hard in his turn.

The beast freezes, a suspicious pout on her face.

"Fuck ..." he sighs as he walks away. He shakes his head, closing his eyes and bringing his hands to his waist before returning to her. "I never thought I would find you, I thought it was still a bogus track that one of those research bastards had passed on to Rice, but when I saw this place ... Then they appeared in front of me and then you ... "

His eyes expressed all the disarray and disbelief that his mouth could not formulate. He had been taken by surprise, unprepared. He had not expected to see her again one day, had not thought about what he would say, what he would do then.

A life spent despising people like her, chasing them for the simple fact of existing, but the first thing he does instinctively when he finds them is to save them. She could not hope for better, and she expected no less from the only man who could tame her.

"You've gone soft, Pierce ..." she laughs sweetly.

He smiles, first discreetly and then finally laughs: "Yeah, that must be that ..."

They take the road again. They do not talk about the fact that they may spend a good part of their lives fleeing, without homes and ties, because it does not matter.

This feeling of completeness that has grown in them since their reunion far exceeds the simple material needs and is worth more than all the sacrifices of the world.

It's obvious; everywhere will be at home as long as the pack is reunited.


End file.
